Book Setting
The novel is set in the 22nd century of the Noon Universe. Mankind is capable of near-instanteneous interstellar travel. Earth social organization is presumably Communist, and can be described as a highly technologically advanced anarchistic meritocracy.
There is no state structure, no institutionalized coercion (no police etc.), yet functioning of the society is safeguarded by raising everyone as responsible individuals, with guidance of a set of High Councils accepted by everyone in each particular field of activity.
It is a society of highly morally evolved individuals that has solved all of its material problems, knows no crime, feels no threats (except possibly from unchecked scientific exploration) and spends much of its efforts in scientific research (space exploration done mostly by volunteers), arts, education and caring for the young. Teachers are the most honorable profession.
One of the controversial occupations is progressor. They are agents embedded in less advanced humanoid civilizations in order to accelerate their development or resolve their problems. Progressors' methods range from rescuing local scientists and artists to overthrowing local governments.
The book is set on one such war-torn post-nuclear war planet, Saraksh, where a space-exploring Earth youth gets stuck after his rocket is first damaged and then blown up, forcing him on his journey of discovery and contact within a fascist society of one of the planet's countries.
Read more about this topic: Prisoners Of Power
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“Remember thee?
Ay, thou poor ghost, whiles memory holds a seat
In this distracted globe. Remember thee?
Yea, from the table of my memory
I’ll wipe away all trivial fond records,
All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past
That youth and observation copied there,
And thy commandment all alone shall live
Within the book and volume of my brain,”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
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